<p>How much does the availability of substance free housing impact your thoughts on a school?</p>
<p>Our son would prefer a substance free living arrangement--he is a student athlete--and committed to being substance free.</p>
<p>I hear from a parent of a freshman at a very prestigous Univ that the school's rules on not drinking in campus housing are completely ignored and no authorities enforce it.</p>
<p>I suspect it is hard to find a “very prestigious university” where rules on not drinking in campus housing are enforced at all. There may be an exception somewhere, but my general impression is that, at least among private universities, prestige and selectivity go hand in hand with minimal rule enforcement. I don’t mean to praise or blame that; just describing.</p>
<p>There are lots of old threads about sub-free dorms, which some colleges have (but not so much the most prestigious ones . . .). You have to pay some attention to the school and the culture. For some kids, at some schools, they are clearly a great option. At other schools, sometimes they seem not to work, especially if a large number of residents have been “involuntarily committed” there by their parents, and have no real interest in being substance-free. </p>
<p>And some colleges house athletes together, so that would complicate things a lot. While I’m certain that athletic housing is substance-free in theory, I believe that reality could be very, very different, depending on the sport.</p>
<p>Thats a great point about athletic housing–
Depending on his ultimate choice, some house their athletes together.</p>
<p>Our son is considering a substance free housing option on his own–
but as you said you can have many residents assignment by the parents–</p>
<p>He is a Jr and we began looking at schools in the spring–and will do another round this spring. Looking for that right match–and school culture varies so from one school to the next even if on paper they look similar.</p>
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<p>It was my daughter’s impression at Cornell that the rules were enforced to some extent, meaning that large parties involving alcohol took place in Greek houses or off-campus apartments, not in the dorms. But I doubt that anyone would have detected people who were quietly drinking privately in a dorm room. And, of course, plenty of alcohol found its way into the dorms when it was already in the students’ bodies.</p>
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<p>In my D’s case, it will make a huge impact on her choice. She very much only wants to go to a school that is substance free overall (dry campus) or has string substance free dorms.</p>
<p>I know finding the first (substance free overall) is virtually impossible but she can get close with certain christian schools she is interested in (at least with the on-campus aspect). </p>
<p>I would however be inteested in finding out about other colleges that have very good, working substance free dorms. Where have people had a good experience with these?</p>
<p>I think Mt Holyoke is a dry campus.
Wash U has substance-free floors in their regular dorms. Not sure how strict the rules are, or how well it works.</p>
<p>We did a tour at a substance free dorm (don’t remember which school) and D pointed out 3 or 4 bottles of booze on the shelf in the room they were showing us. What a joke.</p>
<p>Rather than focus on one narrow aspect, I would recommend taking a much closer look at the overall campus culture with regards to drinking: the surveyed binge drinking rate, the number of students hospitalized with alcohol poisoing in a typical semester, the culture in the dorms, and so on a so forth.</p>
<p>I know for a fact that some of the top colleges most comfortable for non-drinkers or light-drinkers, with some of the lowest binge drinking rates, do not have substance free dorms. So, you could really throw yourself off the scent if you focused your search too much on one aspect of housing policy. </p>
<p>It’s harder to do a more comprehensive analysis. You will need to do a search or two on the college newspaper. Look for any published ad hoc committee reports. Maybe have your kid e-mail the dean and ask for the most recent surveyed binge drinking rate Ask how many students were hospitalized last year. Talk to students about dorm life and whether quiet hours are generally observed. Find out the characteristics that correlate to lower binge drinking.</p>
<p>Saint Olaf is an excellent LAC and has a dry campus.</p>
<p>Substance-Free housing was very important to my oldest two. My oldest didn’t know what it was or that there was such a thing when she started looking at schools.<br>
The school she wanted it had it and she applied and got it and stayed there.
My second asked about it and was relieved as well to find that a school she loved had it.</p>
<p>Incidentally, both these schools have local reputations as party schools. They both had terrific experiences.</p>
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Interesting - I never thought about it but you might be right. #4’s school has very strict policies regarding alcohol in the dorms and it is apparently enforced. According to my daughter there is hardly any binge drinking and alcohol is not a problem. They don’t have substance-free or any theme housing.</p>
<p>My kid opted for the substance free dorm at his top LAC for his freshman year. It was a very positive experience for him. The kids who were there wanted to be there and it became a very tight-knit community. He continues to live with friends he made there and the form they core of his social group.</p>
<p>He doesn’t drink, but doesn’t have issue with people who do. He just didn’t want to live in the thick of that aspect of college life.</p>
<p>He made the decision to choose that dorm based on the experience his best friend (a year older) had when he went to college at Northwestern as a freshman. This kid had certainly imbibed from time to time in high school, but when he got to Northwestern he was really disgusted with how much and how often people drank. He ended up feeling very alienated from the whole social scene there that seemed so driven by alcohol and tranferred after his freshman year.</p>
<p>The other thing that was great about my son’s sub-free dorm is that for whatever reason there was a high percentage of international students in that dorm, and that was a great experience for him to get to be friends with kids from all over the world.</p>
<p>I hadn’t thought about checking the school’s newspaper etc for binge drinking data.</p>
<p>Good advice. Thanks for the tip</p>
<p>D’smom: St. Olaf is an excellent LAC but it is not dry in the sense that there is no drinking there.</p>
<p>You are correct NorthMinnesota.</p>
<p>No school is truly “dry” from what I have researched except perhaps BYU. Kids will be kids and drinking is part of college. That does not mean that all will drink(there are many kids who choose not to drink or ever try drugs), but for the most part every college will have some drinking and drugs even if they claim they are a substance free/dry campus.</p>
<p>It’s my impression that small or rural LAC’s have more of a drinking culture. It must have something to do with the boredom factor. </p>
<p>Our oldest went to a LAC where the alcohol policy was enforced, but our D now goes to a school where there are apparently no rules and nothing seems to be enforced. It really bothers her to the point that she is planning to transfer. One thing she has mentioned is that the international students have less of a tendency to binge drink.</p>
<p>This is a great thread and an issue that continues to be of concern to our S/d as sophomores-so take heart-if you want to have a living experience in college that does not include alcohol/drugs you are not alone and it does take some real work to find those colleges.</p>
<p>Both of our kids eliminated several schools in the final month after more research on several college websites that provided information on the number of days kids were drinking, “funny smells in the air”, etc. Both had been in public and private high schools where ETOH and drugs were plentiful and where one student in past year died of overdose. So…S and D are not ignorant to the culture of most college kids. They DO want a chance to study and make friends, though, with people with similar beliefs, or at least habits conducive to studying. </p>
<p>Here is what they learned after their freshmen year: do not necessarily take the word of the school that the campus is dry or dorms are alcohol free places-even themed-first year housing. Son had 2 weekends where he had to coax another student from the edge of a balcony who was drunk and another weekend call 911 for a student who had alcohol poisoning. This is a top 50 LAC, but is NOT a dry campus-DAMP for sure. </p>
<p>In retrospect, the best way to know what really happens is to spend time and a night in a dorm and ask as many students as possible what really goes on. For example, it is my understanding that alcohol is prevalent at W and L, but the substance free dorms do enforce their policy. When S received roommate assignment for this semester, he was very open with potential roommate about not wanting an in-room drinking situation. Potential roomie was an athlete and was honest enough to say he did drink several nights a week. Luckily, S was able to find a different roommate with more compatible life style and things have gone well so far. </p>
<p>I applaud kids and parents who are willing to make the effort to look for and find substance free housing-it may not always be the trendiest decision, but IMO can make a world of difference in a student’s college experience.</p>
<p>I think the best thing is to fill out your dorm and roommate form as accurately as possible. Nobody can make a student drink and if a student really wants to be substance free and not have that temptation and or be around drinking then they should seriously pick very carefully what dorm they want to be in. Most of the good LAC’s have substance free housing. Again, your children still may notice it going on, but it will be toned down than living in non-substance free living. </p>
<p>There are many excellent LAC’s that “do” allow drinking(meaning that there is no real enforcement against it) on campus, but because they are not huge party schools, they have toned down night life campuses where there is little to no pressure on kids who do not want to drink. We have noticed this at a few of the LAC’s that we have done overnights at. Drinking went on, but there was absolutely no pressure to persuade others to do so.</p>
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my daughter went to one of these. out in the woods. not only drinking but smoking pot was prevalent as well. Summer after Junior year we went to an open house - I was surprised but they were quite open about their reputation.
A new administration was cracking down but what can you really do? drive them deeper in the woods?
Anyway - boredom could be part of it but you know kids at LAC’s they are so sophisticated. They enjoy nothing more that sitting around a campfire drinking beer and discussing world peace.</p>
<p>My daughter never partied in high school. I can honestly say this because she never left the house unless it was school related (a real nerd). Now that she is 21 she drinks some. She lived in substance free housing - which was thankfully well enforced; found a great group of friends freshman year (most of whom she is close friends with) and had a great experience without slinking off into the woods every night/weekend.</p>
<p>Ironically, the state U. that my freshman D is attending, where she resides on the only substance-free floor on campus, was ranked for 2009 one of the Top Ten party schools in the nation.</p>
<p>Rather than being a pariah in this environment, D is enjoying the atmosphere at this college where there is a decided live-and-let-live attitude. She knows many who do drink but mostly hangs with the teetotalers, and is having a great time.</p>
<p>This has just occurred to me, but:</p>
<p>Maybe something else to look for (along with stats on drinking and the drinking culture and substance-free housing), is the availability of non-dorm housing. For instance, my school, Wesleyan, has a graduated system of living, where freshmen live in dorms (with a substance free hall available), sophomores live in dorms or program houses (including Well Being house, which is substance free), and juniors and seniors live in campus owned apartments and houses.</p>
<p>It’s the latter part that is esp. good for non-drinkers, because they can live with other friends who share their feeling, or at least have house rules about what is and isn’t allowed in their house/apartment. </p>
<p>I’m not saying Wes is necessarily the school you should be looking at, but that ability to get out of dorms altogether is definitely something that could be good for someone who wanted to live in a substance free environment (although many schools will require freshmen to live in dorms). Schools where lots of kids live off campus, and their are good/safe off-campus options could also work.</p>